Days 20 - 23 Move on down, move on down the road

Day 20 was a short walk as MK needed the rest. We hiked up a steep hill to a beautiful panoramic view of the countryside.  We reached Ventas de Naron and checked into the albergue. After showers and laundry, we walked to the other side of town (about 5 buildings in total) to the chapel. It was operated by a blind man who was quite a character. He made a big deal about turning on the lights for us and then had us guide his hand to stamp out credentials. We then went back to our albergue for dinner and to watch España vs Italia in the Euro 2016 Copa.
Day 21 - We left in a misty fog the next morning. We walked through some truly beautiful villages. All of the buildings and gardens were covered in hydrangeas and roses. Just gorgeous!
Since I'm trying to give a true impression of the Camino, I wanted to talk toilets for a minute. We basically judge all of our stops and breaks based on the quality of the toilets. We have seen toilets with seats, toilets without seats, and once there wasn't even a toilet - just foot treads and a hole. (Thanks, I'll just wait until the next village.) We’ve seen handle flushers, button flushers, weird knob flushers, and even the old school Nellie Olson style pull chain flushers. We are happy when there is toilet paper, excited when there is soap, and can't believe it when there are actual real live paper towels. (Score!) Seriously, we get excited about these things. (Germophobes, the Camino may not be for you.)
Somewhere along our hike, a local stopped us to ask how far we were going today (Completely in Spanish I might add - my comprehension is getting pretty good.) He said we really needed to go all the way to Melide so we could eat the pulpo. We did actually decide to go all the way to Melide - 26.4k! (16.9 miles!!), but we weren't feeling up to pulpo that night. We actually ended up at a Kebab place where we had felafel and kafta. Not exactly regional cuisine, but it hit the spot!
Day 22 - This was another shorter day (14.5 k). It was either that, or go another 8k as there is not another albergue any closer. Plus, this leaves us with two 19k walks for our final two days.
We are still walking through beautiful, mostly rural, hilly countryside. Much of the path is also through forest.
We finally tried pulpo at our lunch stop. We had it along with calamari, lentil soup, and local cheeses. Yum!
We stopped in Arzua and are now tucked into our albergue. It is full of teens and twenty somethings and is pretty loud and rowdy. This is often the reality as you near Santiago. There are lots of folks doing the pilgrimage lots of different ways for lots of different reasons. It takes some patience sometimes, but life is like this really. Everyone is on their own path doing things their own way. We just need to extend patience and grace towards one another.